The Best and Worst of Amanda Seyfried

“The Best and Worst of” series chronicles the career highlights and lowlights of an actor starring in one of the week's new theatrical releases. This week, I take a look at the filmography of “Mamma Mia!: Here We Go Again” star Amanda Seyfried.

Films starring Amanda Seyfried that I've seen:
Mean Girls
Alpha Dog
Red Riding Hood
In Time
Gone
Lovelace
A Million Ways to Die in the West
Ted 2
Gringo

Best Performance: Mean Girls (2004)
Since Rachel McAdams' performance as Plastics leader Regina George is pretty much legendary at this point in time, Seyfried's similarly brilliant work as Karen Smith,the clique's ditsiest and most redeemable member, gets frequently overlooked. Thanks to Seyfried's note-perfect delivery, just about everything that comes out of Karen's mouth is a quotable, gut-busting home run.  

Worst Performance: Gone (2012)
While I think Seyfried is overrated as a dramatic performer, she's usually MUCH better than she was in Gone. Her painful turn in this ludicrous thriller about a woman (Seyfried) struggling with mental illness that fears the man who kidnapped her years earlier has returned to abduct her sister (Emily Wickersham) is without question some of the most egregious, cringeworthy overacting I've seen in recent years.

Best Film: Alpha Dog (2006)
Anchored by a captivating, fact-based story and some outstanding performances from Emile Hirsch, Justin Timberlake, Ben Foster and the late Anton Yelchin, Alpha Dog ended up being one of my favorite crime dramas of the 2000's. If grim stories featuring largely unlikable characters don't turn you off, I can't recommend this movie enough.

Worst Film: Red Riding Hood (2011)
The success of Twilight spawned a mini-wave of films in the early-2010's that offered up gritty takes on classic fairy tales and animated movies. None of these films were overly well-received by critics or audiences and with the possible exception of Snow White and the Huntsman-which went to spawn a sequel in 2016, have pretty much all disappeared from memory as the end of the decade approaches. Of the entries in this trend-hopping subgenre that I've sat through, Catherine Hardwicke's Red Riding Hood arguably made for the most unpleasant watch. Frequently alternating between over-the-top ridiculous and completely stoic, this poorly-acted gothic romance fails spectacularly as both a love story and campy piece of horror schlock.

Thank you for reading this week's edition of “The Best and Worst of”. The next victim of my praise and ire will be “Mission-Impossible:Fallout” star Henry Cavill.